


Words Were Not Enough (but feelings might be)

by Hatless_Hatter



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: A mild retread of Julian's BRILLIANT plan, Gen, Other, and I just want him to be happy, and afterwards I wrote a bunch of words about how much my Levi loves him, and how he's Worth so much more than what he believes he is, anyway I love Julian a lot, in which my darling husband made me genuinely panic about wether I'd ruined my first playthrough
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-05
Updated: 2020-11-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:15:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,634
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27399337
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hatless_Hatter/pseuds/Hatless_Hatter
Summary: Julian Devorak has a plan.No one who loves him likes it, but they're out of time.Levi refused to let him be alone when it happens.The Arcana didn't want him to be alone afterwards either, it seemed.
Relationships: Apprentice/Julian Devorak, Julian Devorak/Original Non Binary Character
Comments: 3
Kudos: 8





	1. Blood and Dust

His eye searched for theirs from the gallows, the noose already tight around his neck by the time he found them. The corners of his mouth twitch up in a forced brave smile, but the rigid stiffness in his form was far more honest than the bravado Julian displayed. 

His eye widened as if he only just now realized what he had surrendered himself to when the hangman covered his head with the bag many others had met their end under. 

The hangman pulled the lever. 

The floor fell from under the doctor. 

The rope went taught. They thought they could hear the dull snap of spine from within a long, lean neck. They knew they couldn't have heard it; the crowd was too loud with cheers and angry shouts, the gallows too far away for the sound to reach them even if there were no one else in the courtyard. 

Nevertheless, Levi's grip on Julian's blade tensed, the few unbound ridges of the hilt slicing into their palm and drawing blood. They didn't notice. They saw the gangly form of Julian twitch as the last of his life left him, legs dangling limp and wrong as the moments stretched into hellish eternities. 

They tasted salt in their throat as the rope was cut, Julian's body dropping the further two feet to the ground and landing with a sickening, unceremonious puff of sand and dust. They didn't notice how their legs carried them forward, how their arms shoved through the crowd, how a few children who had snuck past the guards gaped at them as they passed, blood on the hand they shoved people aside with, leaving a trail of frightened bloodstained onlookers. 

They didn't make it to Julian's corpse before Portia found them, eyes brimming with tears she refused to shed in public. She locked her hand around Levi's wrist and pulled them toward the palace, grip shaking but sure as they extricated themselves from the throng of excited or horrified city folk. 

"They're taking Il- him to the palace…" Portia's shaking voice informed them, a hitch in her throat as she couldn't say her brother's name. Levi could only nod, their voice unwilling to work. Their hand started to throb now that the initial shock of Julian's… plan had worn off. Their body recovered faster than their mind. Their head spun, their eyes blurred with no tears, their breath came in shallower and shallower gasps. Portia noticed as Levi stumbled up the first flight of stairs to the palace. 

"Levi?!" The short woman called, panic rising in her tone. She turned and grabbed them by the shoulders, looking them in the eyes and trying to have them respond. 

They tried; their mouth opening but only a strangled cry escaping. Their last sight was of Portia's panicked expression and her turning to shout for help. 


	2. Memories and Mistakes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which I reuse a lot of in game conversations.  
> Let me know if any of the descriptions require trigger warnings. There is a fairly grotesque description of a broken neck, so be aware of that if that's not something you're comfortable with. Rather have you pass this by than be triggered. *Kisses*

They were standing in a bog. Ankle deep in a thick sludge of silty mud and murky water. 

A realm of the Arcana, and one they had never been to before. Their sibling had described the Hanged Man's realm as Levi saw it now; dank and unpleasant and littered with thorny brambles wishing to snare you. 

_Don't fight them if they have you. They know what you search for and will take you there if He allows._

The realm of the Hanged Man curls around their ankles, holding but not restraining. Lifting and guiding to a distant red lantern under which a familiar man shakes on his knees, head in his hands, a dark ring of bruises around his crooked neck. 

Levi reaches out, knowing before it happens that they will not be able to reach him. Dense fog swirls around Julian's broken form, the lantern and it's lonely subject is further away than it had been a moment before. 

A raven headed man appears in a flutter of loose feathers, looking down at the shivering Doctor at his feet. No sign of distaste or resentment, but simple curiosity and mild appreciation. 

The raven turns its head to Levi, and they understand that the Hanged Man is smiling at them. They wink at them and the realm folds in on itself, bringing the three beings closer together. The raven places a feathered finger over his beak to implore silence from them. Levi nods, knowing their voice would have failed them even if the Hanged Man had not made his request. 

Julian lifts his head on a broken neck and Levi chokes silently at the sight. Necks were not meant to bend that way. The necklace of black bruises and bleeding skin would certainly have been bad enough. 

The Hanged Man locks an eye with them and his expression seems apologetic if also slightly irritated. It's likely he imagined Levi should have expected the damage of a hanged man to be expected in this of all realms. 

He turns back to the doctor as Julian gets unsteadily to his feet, eyes open, the one uninfected eye bloodshot and both pupils blown wide. Levi had seen him terrified and ready to sacrifice himself before, but never had they seen him so completely sundered. A shaking, quaking mess of a dead man ready to bargain. 

"It worked, then." His voice shook despite his valiant attempt at casual conversation. 

"Indeed." The Hanged Man replied, smiling at the doctor with a sincere kind of pride in his voice. 

"You have found me. What do you require of me that you have done such a drastic thing to have this conversation? What could make you so desperate as to make your loved ones watch you die?" 

The Hanged Man twists the knife to clarify that Julian could very well not come back from this. Levi feels the backlog of sickening fury and terror they'd been ignoring claw its way to the front of their mind, starting a ringing in their ears that made listening to the next exchange impossible. 

Julian replied, a small smirk on his face as he pointed to his right eye; sclera bright red with the plague that nearly killed him and had killed many others. 

The Hanged Man nods his understanding and the ringing in Levi's ears subsides enough to listen again as the Hanged Man continues. 

"Coming here has returned some of your memory, has it not? Do you remember what I showed you three years ago?" 

Julian nods, swallowing hard through a broken neck and his eyes grow cold. His normally smiling mouth contorts into a snarl and he growls. 

"Even when I found out I didn't kill him, I needed to know why I was in his room. Nothing made sense…" Julian drifts off, a bruised hand rubbing the back of his broken neck, his arm jerking away when he felt the severed spine and blood from his execution. He flexed his hand and dropped it to his side. 

"And?" The Hanged Man asks, Levi feels it's more for their benefit than his own. Or perhaps he just wanted Julian to say it for himself. Acknowledge his wants. 

"I went there to kill him." His voice is soft and horrified. As though he can't believe his own words. 

"But… why would…" His face goes stricken. He stares at his hands, as though they would offer more insight. 

"The… the plague was… Lucio was… He was the source of the plague?!" No longer is he frightened by his designs to kill the count. His face contorts in fury, a livid, animalistic rage that Levi had not seen in him before. 

"All those years of sickness… all those people… dead because of him!?" 

The Hanged Man nods, a soft expression on his beaked face as he watches Julian stitch his memories back together. As if he were watching a favorite nephew understand that the dog won't be coming back. 

"Killing Lucio would have cured the plague. That's what you told me all those years ago." Julian snorts with a sad kind of derision. "And here I thought I was being metaphorical about him being a plague on the city." 

He allows himself a momentary look of pride at his own wit and cleverness to have put the pieces together again. Until a shadow passes over his face and he locks eyes with the Hanged Man. 

"The plague is coming back. Then… that means Lucio is too." Julian begins pacing in a small line, arms tucked around his chest as if for warmth. 

"How…? How can he come back?" Julian looks up to the Hanged Man. The raven shrugs. 

"You have a plan to come back to life, don't you?" The unspoken "why wouldn't anyone else?" Hangs in the air as Julian touches the still glowing mark on his throat, eyes going wide again. 

"This mark… I made a deal with you. For the power to heal I… gave up the memories I didn't want." Julian blinks and stares off into the fog. 

"Then… Lucio made a deal to come back. He made a deal with you?" The accusation doesn't fall on deaf ears but The Hanged Man pays it no mind. Julian knew nearly nothing about the Major Arcana. The raven speaks and explains a small part of what they are. 

"I'm not the only one who can make deals. There are others. But the 'who' of us that Lucio made a deal with is up to you to find out. You know everything I can tell you. The rest is up to you." 

Julian stands quite still for a few agonizingly long minutes. The raven headed man looks at him. Waiting for him to do something. 

"So… uh… what now? Do you send me back so I can tell everyone we need to kill Lucio again?" He makes light of the situation despite his terrified eyes. 

"Not quite." The Hanged Man says simply, arms crossed over his feathered chest. He seems to still be waiting for Julian to do something. 

"Okay. Are you going to judge if I'm worthy or not? That sounds likely." 

The raven laughs raucously, and Julian smiles too. The Hanged Man looks him in the eye and explains. 

"Didn't I just say the rest was up to you? Indecision, introspection, inaction… they won't serve you forever. You stand between realms; at a crossroads where you must choose a path. Only you can make that decision." 

Julian looks down at his feet. Still submerged in mud and water, brambles like snakes around his ankles. 

"Only I can… okay. So tell me. What are my options?" 

The Hanged Man gestures with a feathered hand, as though pointing down one road and not the other. 

"Your mark has just enough power to return you to the living realm. Where it will disappear forever. Or…" He sweeps his hand across his body. "You can stay here, in my realm. The cure will reach those who need it. There is much you could learn from me." The raven winks at Levi. Dread pools in their stomach. 

They have such faith in Julian. A man who tries so hard to find the truth, to save everyone he can before it's too late. No matter the cost to him. His own happiness, his sanity, his freedom, his own life. 

He never believed himself worthy of admiration. Of genuine care. Running away from the people who only want to help him. Who want to see him happy and safe. 

Julian believed himself only worth what he can offer to other people. The offer to return to the living, but without the mark that had saved his life and saved so many others… what worth would he see in that? 

"This mark is better than any treatment I've ever given. Didn't matter how fatal the stab wound. Didn't matter the poison. It could save anyone." 

"And without it?" The Hanged Man asks, as if Julian were a child stubbornly clinging to a well loved garment that no longer fit. 

"I… I don't know… I couldn't even find a plague cure myself. I needed you to tell me." Julian rubs at his brows, inhaling deeply. "Killing Lucio? Anyone could have done that. Asra. Nadia. Half his courtiers would have taken a stab at it." He looks tired. Miserable. As he considers everything he's done in life and only counts the failures. 

"Even when I knew the cure, I couldn't get there in time. Someone else did it… and what good is a plague doctor without a plague… what good am I?" 

Levi wants nothing more than to take him by the shoulders and shake sense into him. List the names of people who love him. Who want him back whole and hale. Tears well in their eyes as they see the man they've come to love tear himself to pieces over what he's not rather than what he is and could become. The Hanged Man casts a sidelong look at them and smiles. 

"Let's say I go back. Deliver the cure." 

"Then what?" The raven asks, head cocked to the side. 

"Then…-" Julian fades out, face dropping. He stares out into the fog. He looks utterly lost. 

"Then I…" 

"Did you even have a plan for what came after?" The Hanged Man queries, voice soft. Julian blinks into the fog. His eyes look vaguely watery. When he speaks his voice is distant and sad. 

"All this time I thought I was coming back to pay for my crimes. I didn't think 'after' was on the table." He looks back to the Hanged Man when his beak opens again to speak. 

"Here things stay the same. There, things change. Constantly. The future is shrouded in uncertainty. So what will you do when you reach that precipice?"

Julian laughs miserably when the Hanged Man finishes. 

"What'll I do? Get into trouble. Drag everyone down with me. Run away. Lose sleep over it. Find more trouble. And…" Julian's face crumbles from the dark smirk he'd worn for that speech into a desolate mask of self hatred and despair. 

"And I'll hurt people again. I know I will. It happens every time. Without fail. Nadia. Asra. Pasha. Mazelinka… I wasn't there for them. And… I wasn't there for Abigail… or Levi."

Their heart stutters as he says their name. He knows he hurt them when he surrendered without telling them. Without giving any reason until after he had been found guilty of a murder her didn't commit. Their eyes sting with tears they want to shed but know it won't make a difference. He can't see them. Shedding tears over someone who already thinks so little of themselves won't help. 

"If I stay here I'll be abandoning them again." His chest shudders, a quiet sob he can't bring himself to release. His broken neck leans forward to bring his chin to his chest, drawing a strangled cry from Levi's throat. They have to look away. He hanged himself to have this conversation with an arcana in order to save people and he still thinks himself worthless. 

Julian raises his head up again and lets a few tears fall before blinking them away and continuing to speak. 

"But if I go back… will I do any better? Can I do better? What if I'm worse? Will I just find another crime, another transgression to hang for? Another way to fail them?" He brings his hands to his face again, finger tips digging into his scalp as he let loose a heart wrenching sob. 

Fear ripples through Levi's body as Julian torments himself. He believes he failed them. How? They haven't known each other for very long. How could he have failed them? 

"Ah. The twins. You're regaining those memories too." 

Julian falls to his knees and claws at the back of his head, as if trying to rip out the part of his brain that holds the painful memories of his failure. Levi wants only to reach out and comfort him but they know they can't. They settle for kneeling down with him. 

"I…" He breathes, shaking as he speaks. "When I met Levi I thought they were familiar. I had no idea I was right." 

Levi starts, blinking at the broken man before them. 

"You were not strangers, were you?" The raven calls, a tinge of ironic mirth in their tone. Nothing malicious. 

"I knew them four years ago. I took them and their sibling on as apprentices at my clinic, even." Julian slams a fist into the mud beneath him and his shoulders shake with silent sobs. When he continues, his voice is harsh with desperate pain. 

"But they both… when they needed me I wasn't there. I was so wrapped up in finding a cure I didn't realize both of them were sick." 

Julian looks up at the Hanged Man, a desperate expression on his face. The Hanged Man offers him a hand up and Julian takes it in a shaking grip, tears falling down his face. 

Levi couldn't believe it. Their mind screamed it wasn't possible. 

"I didn't realize until it was too late that they had both… died. Oh god. Levi I'm sorry." Julian presses his clean hand to his mouth and closes his eyes, his entire body trembling. 

Levi stood stock still as numbness and shock coursed through them. They don't… they can't… and yet they know it's true. They can feel it. In their bones. In their blood. In the headache beating at their temples. The scream in their chest desperate to get out. 

In the howling, gaping silence of their past. The careful, slow way Asra had brought Levi and their twin together after he'd seen them in the market. Hesitant and desperate for something to remind them of who they had been. Remember and not destroy what they are now. 

Julian looks out into the fog once more, his face set. 

"I know what I want to do." 

Levi feels a sudden yank around their middle. The realm of the Hanged Man fades and Levi wakes with a scream. 


	3. Begging for Blessings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In this house we jump to the action! No post nightmare scenes today.   
> We get right to the good heartbreaking good stuff. (Can you tell I'm a writer? I used good twice the same sentence!)

Valdemar's blade paused above Julian's clavicle, their cruel red eyes laughing silently at the sight of Portia and Levi's entrance into the dungeon. Both parties ruffled, sweaty, gasping for breath as they searched for their companion's corpse. How devoted of them. 

Valdemar pressed the scalpel into Julian's skin and cut halfway down his chest in one fluid movement. Cold, coagulate blood seeps out of the wound and Portia roars a wordless fury. 

Levi doesn't waste any of their shallow breath, unsheathing the dagger at their hip, teeth bared and eyes flashing at the thing that had stolen their loved one. 

They let Julian's dagger fly at Valdemar, the blade gleaming in the torch light. Magic lanced from their fingers after it, bright red and blue magic, formless, shapeless, full of malice for its target. 

The Queastor dodges the blade but not the magic, flinging them across the room and against the wall of the operation theatre. Portia sprints after them, bringing a chair to hopefully attack Valdemar with. 

The Queastor laughs and runs from them, down a stair well Portia doesn't dare follow them down. 

Levi nearly trips over their own feet as they come to Julian's side, his body motionless. As lifeless as it had been the moment after his neck snapped. The postmortem bruises around his neck a grim necklace. 

Portia comes up beside them, her face fighting tears as she sees her brother's corpse for the first time. She reaches out a hand to brush a lock of his hair from his closed eyes, her hands trembling. Levi looks to her friend's face and sees tears silently falling down her face. They turn to her and gently wipe them away, giving them a reassuring smile they hope looks convincing. 

"Let's get him to the guest rooms. As much as we both know he'd love the drama of waking up down here. I'd rather wait in a comfy chair than this place." They joke, but their heart is seizing in their chest. They can't help but wonder why Julian hasn't awakened yet. Dread claws at their stomach and eats at their control. Their hands shake as they pull Julian's arms around their neck and sling his long, lanky form completely over their shoulders. If he chose now to wake up it would be hilarious. 

The moment passes. 

Portia lets out a quiet, disappointed sigh. She leads the way back to the lift and slides herself as far back as she can go so all three of them can leave at the same time. None of them want to be down here any longer than they have to. 

The ride is silent of any conversation. Neither of them have anything to say. Julian usually talked enough for all of them. 

They carry Julian to Levi's guest room, where Asra and Abigail sit by each other on the couch, drawing magic circles and runes in preparation for something Levi had not been told about. 

They look up from their work and their faces fall from greeting smiles to confusion to dawning horror. 

"He… he's not awake yet?" Asra questions softly, disbelieving his eyes. Magenta iris' study Julian's limp form as Levi gently lays him on their bed, fixing his shirt and magicking away the blood that had continued to seep out of the cut as they carried him. Levi drags a chair over to the bedside and sits themself down in it, eyes staring at their hands, Julian's blood still damp on their fingers. Cold and lifeless as the corpse in their bed. 

Abigail's hand rests on their shoulder and gently draws their sibling into a warm embrace. Portia is next to join in the huddle, her sweet lemon perfume as pleasant and soft as ever. 

Levi refuses to cry. Tears would solve nothing now. All it would do is tire them out. They didn't have the energy to spare. 

Asra excuses himself as a servant calls him to Nadia's aide, Abigail following along behind. Portia stays as long as she can before she can't stand to do nothing but wait any longer. She runs to help with the masquerade preparations; something she can control and help with. 

She can't help her brother wake up from death any faster. 

Levi was alone with Julian. 

His body. 

His corpse. 

The shell of the man they loved so completely, it hurt. It hurt to hear him say he was nothing but a failure. As though effort wasn't evidence enough of his drive to help people. To save them from pointless, painful death. 

As though he hasn't sacrificed himself for dozens if not hundreds of people. Taking their wounds and would-have-been deaths and harming himself to save them. 

As though that wasn't how they met. 

Levi looks to the now cold form on their bed, a lump forming in their throat as they force themselves to look at the dislocated neck and the necklace of black and red skin. 

Their tears fall without their bidding and slide down their cheeks and throat, soaking their shirt collar. They wipe away some of them with their sleeve before leaning towards Julian, running their hand through his beautiful auburn hair, twisting a lock or two like he would have crooned for. 

"I know you're scared." They whisper, mostly to themselves, voice soft but clear. No choked desperation to be heard as they spoke to their loved one. 

"You're afraid you'll hurt us. Afraid you'll try to do better and fail because that's what you think you've done in the past." Their fingers tremble as they run their fingertips over the incision Valdemar had created. They try a little magic to mend the wound, but the magic won't work on a corpse. 

"You couldn't be more wrong, Julian." Levi continues, head resting by his as they tell him everything they couldn't in the Hanged Man's realm. 

"You try so hard to help people, dear. You take so much of other people's burdens you forget that you don't have to. You forget that we can do that for you. Your sister. Mazelinka. Abigail. Asra. Me." 

Their throat begins to swell as they lose control of their feelings of loss and heartbreak and face the idea that Julian might not have chosen to come back. He might have believed that everyone who tried so hard to keep him alive were better off without him. 

"You forgot that you're worth more than the amount of suffering you can take for others. You forgot about trying so hard to save people before you got the mark. What part of all that effort made you believe you failed? You nearly died trying to find a cure. You  _ did _ die to remember the one you found. You're the only person who thinks you're a failure, Ilya." 

Levi clutches a cold, lifeless hand in their own and squeezes as hard as they can. Something,  _ something _ has to bring him back. 

"Come back, Julian." They beg the corpse on the bed, tears staining its white shirt as they press their face into its shoulder. 

"You forgot we love you, Ilya. You forgot we want you safe and happy. You forgot you can still save people without the mark. You don't have to torture yourself to save others." 

Exhaustion crashes down on Levi and their eyes close as they feel themself falling asleep again. 

"Wake up, Julian." They ask, a shaking request of a whisper. 

"Come back to us. Come back to me." 

The flash of bright white light near Julian's throat goes completely unnoticed by Levi as they drifted off to sleep. The shifting of the bed was enough to make them blink and groan, but a quiet voice shushed them and rubbed their shoulders as the world shifted and became soft beneath them. 

Warmth covered them and Levi dreamt of a flowing white shirt and bright auburn hair. 


	4. Waking and Wanting

They awoke with a start, completely awake and aware of where they were. And aware of what wasn't where they currently lay. 

They looked around and saw no sign of Julian's body on the bed next to them. They saw nothing indicating a struggle with a heavy corpse. 

Someone had taken Julian again. Someone with a kind of strength Levi did not have. 

They let out a quiet furious sob at the idea of not knowing who or even  _ when  _ they took him. What if they were too late and they had already started… 

A shift in the corner of the room caught their attention, a blur of white and black sitting in the sun set something down and came closer, arms outstretched. 

Panic flashed in their mind as it got closer. What if they took Julian? What if they worked for Valdemar and they wanted them too? 

They kicked and writhed and wailed as a hand with long, cold fingers wrapped around their wrist. 

"No!" They cried, magic tingling in their fingertips as they fought the grasp. They wouldn't be taken to the Quaestor. They needed to find Julian. 

"Levi!" A man's voice implored, tired and rough, as though they were in pain. 

"Levi, it's me. Darling it's me." The grip loosened, but didn't let go. The white and black shape moved to the side of the bed and lowered itself until only the white shone in the sunlight. Making itself smaller. Not a threat. 

Levi stopped struggling. Their breathing slowed and returned to normal. 

They blinked furiously, trying to clear their vision of the fitful sleep they'd had. 

A mess of wavy auburn hair sat on top of a tired but grinning face. A face that Levi had started to doubt they would see alive again. 

A moment passed where they simply stared at each other. 

Another moment passed before Levi launched themselves at the man they loved. They wrapped their arms around his shoulders and pulled him tight against their chest. 

Julian apparently had little strength at the moment and fell backwards onto the rug, Levi on top of him. 

He groaned and squeezed his eyes shut for a moment before opening them and beaming up at them. His breath was labored, his skin sweaty, and he had a haunted look in his eyes, but he was  _ alive _ . 

Levi slid off of him, their hand coming to rest on his abdomen and his hair, their head pressed against his chest, their ear over his heart, listening to the steady, healthy beat. 

A few moments passed just as they were; sprawled out on the floor, tangled in a blanket and each other's arms. 

"Hey," Julian sighed, tilting his head up to look at the person laying on his chest. He brought a hand to their head and ran his fingers through their ruffled hair. "What's wrong? Why the tears?" 

Levi had spent so long crying they were surprised they could still shed tears. They shook their head and clutched him closer to their chest, as though afraid he were going to disappear. 

"I'm not going anywhere." He murmurs, carding his fingers through their hair and over their scalp, sending tingles down their spine. 

"I…" He starts again, voice thick with an emotion Levi can't place just yet. 

"I'm sorry." He doesn't elaborate on  _ why _ he's sorry, but Levi knows he thinks he has so many reasons to be sorry. 

_ I'm sorry I left you that day. I'm sorry I dragged you into this. I'm sorry I left you at the top of the lift. I'm sorry I didn't tell you my plan. I'm sorry you watched me die. I'm sorry you weren't sure I was coming back. I'm sorry you chose me. I'm sorry.... I'm sorry…  _

"I missed you." They whisper, almost too quiet to hear. Julian's heart stutters for a moment as their words register. His arms jerkily come to rest around Levi's shoulders, trembling with either emotion or exhaustion. 

Levi tilts their head to look at him; his pale skin shining in the sun as it set, a golden red glow hitting his hair in a facsimile of a campfire. He looks beautiful. 

Their brow creases when they see the dark bruises around his throat. The red rope burns and torn skin. They look further down and see he's buttoned up his shirt for the first time since they've known each other. Red seeps through the cloth. 

Julian's face falls as he sees Levi's expression. 

"I'm fine." He says and his voice is rougher than they'd ever heard it. He was clearly  _ not _ fine. 

Levi sat up, looking at the man sprawled under them and inhaling sharply. Now that they could see all of him they saw how damaged he was. 

His neck had been healed when he came back to life, but that was apparently all the power the mark had had left. Julian's body was as bruised and beaten as it would have been if he'd been partially stangled instead of completely hanged. 

Their face falls and Julian's mouth starts to quiver, his eyes looking away from them. Tears form and his breath hitches as Levi trails their fingers over his bruised jaw and torn throat. 

"I'm sorry." He repeats, closing his eyes, unable to bear looking at their exhausted, stricken face. 

"I'm so sorry… I shouldn't have let you watch- I should have made Asra take you anywhere else. I'm so fucking sorry Le-" They cut him off with a desperate kiss, lips quivering with an amount of emotion they can't control or contain. 

They pull back from him and guide him to look at them, beaming through their watering eyes. 

"I'm so fucking happy you're back, Ilya." 

Julian's head falls back to the rug with a soft thump, a quiet groan of pain escaping him as he does. 

Levi trails their fingers around his throat, channelling magic through their skin, healing bruises and sealing the torn skin. He sighs as they do so, eyes fluttering closed. 

When their hand trails to his clavicle he starts, as if only now remembering the incision on his chest. 

"How did-?" He begins to ask before Levi answers the unfinished question. 

"Valdemar." They say quietly, magic becoming more vibrant and potent, but forcing the skin to heal too quickly, sparking pain through the rest of his chest as the skin stretched. 

"Oh…" He said softly, shivering as the pain passed and left him gasping in poorly hidden pleasure. 

"Thanks." 

"Any time." They say, their finger trailing down his chest as they heal the wound, leaving behind the beginning of a shiny scar. Julian's marked hand found theirs and laced their fingers together, his cool skin soothing to their fiery, magically tingling grasp. 

They both lapse into comfortable, exhausted silence, Levi pressing their ear to his chest as their eyes fluttered closed for the third time that day, but for the first time, they felt a sense of peace falling over them. 

Julian was  _ alive _ . His heart beat steadily under their head, his chest rose and fell with painless breaths. His skin was his normal cool instead of the grotesque cold of a corpse. 

_ He came back _ . 

Julian's arms encircled them and pulled them closer, his chin resting on their head, a slight trembling in his body. Levi placed one hand on his heart, fingernails digging into the skin just enough to make him inhale a hiss of excitement. Their other hand snaked under his arm and shoulder to grip his hair, running their fingers through the auburn locks that; now that they thought about it, probably needed to be washed. 

They grinned and sighed, petting his hair as they both let their emotional and physical exhaustion take hold of them and fall asleep on the floor of Levi's palace bedroom, right next to the bed. 

Nadia would never let them live it down. 


End file.
